Title

How much nitrogen do you really need?

Problem Scenario

This project is helping people who grow plants so that they know how much nitrogen in their fertilizer they will really need to have their plants grow to there best.

Broad Question

What is the effect of fertilizer on plant growth?

Specific Question

How many leaves produce depending on the different amounts of nitrogen?

Hypothesis

My hypothesis is that more leaves will produce with more nitrogen.

Graph of Hypothesis

Variables

Independent Variable:

The different amount of nitrogen

Dependent Variable:

The number of leaves

Variables That Need To Be Controlled:

The plants are in the same area
The same amount of amount light
The plants are all the same species
The plants all have the same amount of soil

Vocabulary List That Needs Explanation

Nitrogen

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noun Chemistry .
a colorless, odorless, gaseous element that constitutes about four-fifths of the volume of the atmosphere and is present in combined form in animal and vegetable tissues, especially in proteins: used chiefly in the manufacture of ammonia, nitric acid, cyanide, explosives, fertilizer, dyes, as a cooling agent, etc. Symbol: N; atomic weight: 14.0067; atomic number: 7; density: 1.2506 g/l at 0°C and 760 mm pressure.
http://dictionary.reference.com/

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General Plan

I am going to plant seeds and add the average amount of nitrogen in our area to it.
I am going to have 4 tests on with the average amount, o amount of nitrogen, double the amount of nitrogen, and half the average amount of nitrogen. there is going to be 3 plants for each test. I am going to calculate how many leaves produce from each different stage of the different amounts of nitrogen.

Potential Problems And Solutions

A problem that I could have is the plants could die, that is why I am planting 3 plants for each test and their are 4 tests.
I could run out of fertilizer, so I will know where I can get more if I do run out.
The plants could get knocked over, that is why ill have 3 of each test.

Safety Or Environmental Concerns

Somebody could eat the fertilizer that is why I will keep it in a enclosed area.
Somebody in the area could be near the plants and be allergic and have a reaction, that is why the nurse is right down stairs.

Experimental Design

What is your experimental unit?

The unit of my experiment is the 3 plants for each test

Number Of Trials:

I will repeat this experiment 3 times

Number Of Subjects In Each trial:

I am going to have 4 subjects one without nitrogen, one with the normal amount, one with half the normal amount, and one with double the normal amount.

Number of Observations:

How many measurements will you take for each experimental unit times the number or trials

When data will be collected?

My data will be collected from January 29 to March 1.

Where will data be collected?:

The data will be collected in a note book that I will use just for this experiment.

Resources and Budget Table

Item	Number needed	Where I will get this	Cost
seeds	12	Mr.Biche	0
cups	12	Had Them	0
Fertilizer	1 bag	Paris Farmers	$7.00
Poster board	1		$5.00

Detailed Procedure

1) I will plant the seeds into soil
2) I will give each one a different amount of nitrogen
one non, one .025 grams of nitrogen, one half the amount of nitrogen .013, and one double the average amount .05
3) I will have 3 rows of 4 different stages
4) I will water the plants every other day with a small vile
5) I will keep track of the plant growth every other day when I water
6) I will take pictures of the growth every Friday
7) Once the leaves produce I will keep track of the amount of flowers from each different level.

Diagram

Photo List

I will take a photo of the materials I use to put on my poster
I will take a picture of the plants growth every Monday and Friday
I will take pictures of me watering the flowers and measuring the nitrogen

Time Line

Procedure timeline and photo list complete 2/1
Began experiment 2/3
Experiment done 3/1
Analysis 3/7
Discussion/background 3/15
Wiki complete 3/15
Make poster 3/16
Finish poster 3/22
Practice 3/22
Kms Science fair 3/29

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Data Table

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Data Analysis

All Raw Data

			Control Data
Time	0	0.013	0.025	0.05
4	0	0	0	0
6	1.333	1.667	1	1.333
8	1.667	1.667	1.667	2
10	2	2	1.667	2
12	2	2	2	2
14	2.333	2	2	2.333
16	3.333	2.667	2.667	3.667
18	4	3.667	2.667	3.667
20	4	3.667	3.333	4
22	4	3.667	3.333	4
24	4	4	3	4.667
26	4.333	4	3.333	4.667

Results Graph

Photos

1) February 6th, This is a picture of the first bud that sprouted.
2) February 8th, Plants are growing really good.
3)February 11th, Their are still 3 plants growing in each pot. 4) February 15th, I cut each plant down so there is only one plant in each pot.

5) February 18th, Plants are still looking really good, although they are getting really tall. Almost to tall to hold there own weight.
6) Mon 22nd, One of the .013 plants has fallen down and is starting to die. 7) February 25nth, Almost all of them are coming to the end of there life cycle and are starting to die.

8) March 1st, Most are in really bad shape
and are coming close to dyeing. Last picture.

Results

During this experiment I measured the amounts of leaves that produced from each level of nitrogen. During the experiment I couldn't really tell what plant was growing better then the others. But in the end my data came out just as I suspected. I thought that the plant with the most nitrogen,.05, would grow the best and it did, it came out to 16.00 leaves produced. The most amount of leaves grew with the larger amounts of nitrogen. The next greatest amount of leaves grew with the .025 the amount of leaves produced from this level was 11.00. The next greatest amount of leaves produced was .013 and the amount of leaves produced from that was 8.00. The lowest amount of leaves produced was 4.00 and that was from the plants with no nitrogen, which was expected.

Conclusion

I hypothesized that more leaves would produce with more nitrogen. That is exactly what happened the biggest nitrogen level, .05, produced the most leaves, 16.00. Therefor I accept my hypothesis. I suspected this would happen because I thought that wouldn't something grow better if it had a little more, not to much so it kills the plant, but just a little more.

Discussion

After I analyzed my data and looked at my graph I immediately saw a trend in my graph, The plants with the bigger levels of nitrogen produced more leaves. So .05 had the most leaves then .025, then .013, then 0. From my data I was a able to answer my question that started the experiment, how many leaves produce depending on the different levels of nitrogen? I could easily answer this question, of course the different levels of nitrogen affect plant growth, if more leaves grew on the plants with the bigger levels of nitrogen compared to the plants with little to no nitrogen.
During this experiment I had no trouble with my data or anything else, although I was curious of why all the plants looked so similar even though they had different levels of nitrogen and seemed like they should look a little different. But in the end I did have an answer that the levels with the most nitrogen have more leaves. You must just have to have outrageously different amount of nitrogen levels. A way I would advance this experiment if I were to do it again is I would have it under the light full time to have them grow better. I would also add more soil to the plants because they ended up getting so tall, to tall to hold their own weight. Besides that I wouldn't change a thing

Benefit to Community and/or Science

I did this experiment to see how much nitrogen would help grow plants better. This experiment could help not only me and my family because we grow a garden but also other farmers and gardeners. It could help if you didn't know how much nitrogen you want to put in your plants to help them out a little. I would think that scientist could actually use this knowledge in the real world to know how much nitrogen to put in the fertilizer they sell. You could also find out each states different average levels of nitrogen then doubling that number to get the best amount of nitrogen to put in fertilizers all around the world. That would be cool to have every state have their own personal fertilizer with the perfect amount of nitrogen in it!
If I were to repeat this experiment to improve or try new things I would want to try an outrageous amount of nitrogen to put to the plants to see if it made the plants grow better or if it was way to much and kill the plant. I would also maybe want to try two or three different types of plants to see if my results that the plants with the bigger amount of nitrogen grow better works on all plants. Not just the type I used. One other thing I would want to improve on my experiment is having the outside in the summer so they can grow with the natural outside nitrogen plus the levels I put in them and see how it affects the plants.

Background Research

What helped me a lot on my science project was a book called Nitrogen Pollution:From The sources To The Sea. This helped me find out the average amount of nitrogen that falls per year.

References

Dictionary.com. Dictionary.com, n.d. Web. 20 Mar. 2013.

Abstract

For my project I wanted to find how much nitrogen you should add to your plants to help them grow the best. To figure this out I planted 12 plants and added 4 different nitrogen levels to each, .025 the average amount of nitrogen that falls per year in our area, .05 double the average amount, .013 half the average, and 0 nitrogen. The reason there were 12 plants is because I wanted to have 3 plants of each level in case one died to early and to make sure the data turned out right. After I planted the seeds I just watched them grow. To tell which plant was growing the best I counted the amount of leaves that produced from each nitrogen level. In the end the plants with .05 had the most leaves produced which I figured from the beginning.